Katal

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katal
SI
Unit ofcatalysis
Symbolkat
In SI base units:mol/s

The katal (symbol: kat) is that

catalytic activity that will raise the rate of conversion by one mole per second in a specified assay system.[1] It is a unit of the International System of Units (SI)[1] used for quantifying the catalytic activity of enzymes (that is, measuring the enzymatic activity level in enzyme catalysis
) and other catalysts.

The unit 'katal' is not attached to a specified measurement procedure or assay condition, but any given catalytic activity is: the value measured depends on experimental conditions that must be specified.[2][3] Therefore, to define the quantity of a catalyst in katals, the catalysed rate of conversion (the rate of conversion in presence of the catalyst minus the rate of spontaneous conversion) of a defined chemical reaction is measured in moles per second.[4] One katal of trypsin, for example, is that amount of trypsin which breaks one mole of peptide bonds in one second under the associated specified conditions.[clarification needed]

Definition

One katal refers to an amount of enzyme that gives a catalysed rate of conversion of one mole per second.[5][6] Because this is such a large unit for most enzymatic reactions, the nanokatal (nkat) is used in practice.[6]

The katal is not used to express the

liter
per second. Rather, the katal is used to express catalytic activity, which is a property of the catalyst.

SI multiples

SI multiples of katal (kat)
Submultiples Multiples
Value SI symbol Name Value SI symbol Name
10−1 kat dkat decikatal 101 kat dakat decakatal
10−2 kat ckat centikatal 102 kat hkat hectokatal
10−3 kat mkat millikatal 103 kat kkat kilokatal
10−6 kat μkat microkatal 106 kat Mkat megakatal
10−9 kat nkat nanokatal 109 kat Gkat gigakatal
10−12 kat pkat picokatal 1012 kat Tkat terakatal
10−15 kat fkat femtokatal 1015 kat Pkat petakatal
10−18 kat akat attokatal 1018 kat Ekat exakatal
10−21 kat zkat zeptokatal 1021 kat Zkat zettakatal
10−24 kat ykat yoctokatal 1024 kat Ykat yottakatal
10−27 kat rkat rontokatal 1027 kat Rkat ronnakatal
10−30 kat qkat quectokatal 1030 kat Qkat quettakatal

History

The General Conference on Weights and Measures and other international organizations recommend use of the katal.[7] It replaces the non-SI enzyme unit of catalytic activity. The enzyme unit is still more commonly used than the katal,[6] especially in biochemistry.[citation needed][8] The adoption of the katal has been slow.[6][9]

Origin

The name "katal" has been used for decades. The first proposal to make it an SI unit came in 1978,[6][10] and it became an official SI unit in 1999.[6][11][12] The name comes from the Ancient Greek κατάλυσις (katalysis), meaning "dissolution";[13] the word "catalysis" itself is a Latinized form of the Greek word.[13][14]

References

External links

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